Dedicating the award to her school, Berton said the project was born because her students in LA and people in India wanted to make a human rights difference .

“I share this award with the Feminist Majority Foundation, the entire team and cast. I share this with the teachers and students around the worlds – a period should end a sentence, not a girl’s education,” she said.

﻿

The documentary feature is set in Hapur village outside Delhi, where women lead a quiet revolution as they fight against the deeply rooted stigma of menstruation.

For generations, these women did not have access to sanitary pads, which lead to health issues and girls dropping out from schools.

When a sanitary pad vending machine is installed in the village, the women learn to manufacture and market their own pads, empowering their community. They name their brand FLY .

Other documentary shorts nominated in the category were Black Sheep, End Game, Lifeboat and A Night at the Garden.

There has been an increased focus on period hygiene in India, which was also the subject of a mainstream Bollywood movie Padman, starring Akshay Kumar in the lead role in a biopic on Arunachalam Muruganantham, who started making low cost pads in his village despite being ostracised.

India’s moment at the Oscars comes exactly a decade after A.R. Rahman and sound engineer Resul Pookutty won the Academy awards for Slumdog Millionaire in 2009.